


Sky Flowers

by tarnishedpeonies



Category: Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers Generation One
Genre: Family Fluff, M/M, New Year's Eve, New Year's Kiss
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-01
Updated: 2021-01-01
Packaged: 2021-03-11 10:35:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,595
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28469910
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tarnishedpeonies/pseuds/tarnishedpeonies
Summary: The family celebrates another loop around the sun with fireworks, refreshments, and human traditions? Well, they're trying.
Relationships: Ratchet/Wheeljack (Transformers)
Comments: 1
Kudos: 19
Collections: The Parts Bin Server Fic Exchange 2020-2021





	Sky Flowers

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Kiyuo_Honoo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kiyuo_Honoo/gifts).



Swoop’s beak pressed into Wheeljack’s range of vision as he fastened the last cylinder in place. Wheeljack pressed the beak back as he stood up. “Ratchet, if you don’t hurry you’ll miss the display - _my_ display,” Wheeljack pouted over comms. “The kids and I spent the last lunar cycle working on it!” Although most of that work might have been just keeping ‘the kids’ out of the explosives while Wheeljack worked. Dinobots get into everything, and most Autobots agreed Wheeljack didn’t need help getting things to explode.

“Don’t get your fuel line in a knot, I’ll be there! I just finished patching up the last of the ‘bots from that little soiree Megatron held at Times Square. Just let me wash up and I’ll meet you on top of the Ark.”

Checking the connectors one last time, Wheeljack pulled back and looked at the skies; perfectly clear, and dark save for the pinpricks of light from millions of Earth years ago. “Spike tell Grimlock when clock strikes you make wish,” the Dinobot king announced loudly. “But Grimlock say if clock tries strike, Grimlock hit back! Then make wish,” he declared with a nod.

“I think that just mean when the clock chimes, Grimlock,” Wheeljack shakes his head, grinning behind his mask. “Not that the clock is going to actually hit you.”

Grimlock huffed. “Then why clock have hands!”

Wishing Ratchet would get here faster, Wheeljack shook his head. Ratchet always sounded more patient with their creations. “I mean, probably because they point at things. Like fingers? And no, I don’t know why they don’t call them _fingers_ instead of hands,” he caught the question before it was asked, reaching to give Grimlock a pat on the side. “Trust me, no clock is going to be a match for you. It’d be over before it started,” his processor paused on that thought, getting lost briefly in a thought based in time; if they could stop something before it started…hm. He’d need some francium, it had enough energy to power a time-tampering device. Except, here on Earth francium tended to degrade extremely quickly, so he’d need a stabilization chamber first, then mine the francium directly into the stabilization chamber, and _then_ \- 

Ratchet whistled and snapped his fingers in front of Wheeljack’s optics. “Hello, Ratchet to Wheeljack, anyone in there? I don’t know what you’re up to, but can it for now, all right?”

“Right! I am definitely not coming up with a way to freeze Decepticons in their place.”

Ratchet laughed and shook his head. “Come on, we’re less than fifteen minutes away! I brought energon, the high-grade,” he said quieter, “fancy cubes, and the Dinobots are fighting over whose going to wish for what when the clock strikes twelve,” the medic looked back over his shoulder at the scene; thankfully away from the set-up, the Dinobots were wrestling it out like they’d been taught they could do outside the Ark. “I tried to point out they could all wish for the same thing but Slag wasn’t having it. Apparently they all want more of that cesium salami they got for the humans’ winter-time celebrations,” he mused.

“It’s expensive,” Wheeljack pointed out, patting the spot next to him so Ratchet would sit.

“The materials you’d need to make an invention that freezes Decepticons in their place would be expensive,” Ratchet points out, putting the canisters and cubes down before reaching over and grasping Wheeljack’s shoulder firmly. “I’m not saying no new inventions, but they do deserve our time, and consideration,” Ratchet points out with a grin. “So for their birthday then.”

Wheeljack watched Ratchet arrange the cubes, pouring a lot of energon into five, and a little high grade into two - enough to wet the whistle. “Yeah, their birthday,” he agreed, looking back up at Ratchet with a grin behind his mask. “When is that again?”

It wasn’t a joke but Wheeljack liked the sound of Ratchet’s laugh, like music to his audials. Accepting the cube Ratchet handed him, he watched as Ratchet arranged the other cubes in a diamond pattern. The Dinobots were still wrestling, he could hear them, but all he could see was - that smile, that wonderful face crowned by a dark chevron. Those steady medic’s hands, as steady performing a brake line bypass as they were pouring energon. “Are you sure we shouldn’t switch it up? Get them some beryllium bologna?”

“We could try it,” Ratchet agreed, looking over to the Dinobots. “Giving them new experiences, helping them learn new things - that’s important too. But carefully, in a controlled environment.” So no high-grade for the Dinobots tonight.

“You know, in all the time we’ve been seeing each other, I don’t think I’ve ever heard you mention progeny. Or, wanting to be a progenitor.” It wasn’t the same thing, necessarily; but Ratchet was good at both, helping to raise the next generation _and_ taking on the responsibilities, the duties that came with it.

Ratchet finally looked back at him, smiling. “You never asked. But, I never brought it up either,” he agreed. “I mean after a while there it didn’t seem like anything was going to get better and I was just - shoving cement in the cracks to try and plug up a leaky dam. So to speak,” he clarified quickly. They didn’t really have dams on Cybertron, not like they were on Earth, but since coming to Earth they’d come across more than enough. Earth, the things in it - they were seeping into the collective Autobot lexicon. “Didn’t think I’d ever get the chance to do more than patch mechs up to send them back into the fray.”

Looking down at the high-grade in his cube, and the five unclaimed cubes in front of Ratchet, Wheeljack looked back up to Ratchet and nodded. “Then - is it too weird a time to ask - what, it is you want?” Eight minutes. The display was too important to forget. Then again, so was Ratchet.

The way he looked down at his own cube, then locked optics with Wheeljack - the inventor wasn’t good at reading other bots, or connecting with them. Ratchet was, did, and it was how their relationship had lasted so long. Wheeljack was pretty sure the medic found how inept he was fun. Or funny. Or just plain cute? Could ineptitude with other bots be cute?

“You’re not listening,” Ratchet laughed as he tuned back in. “Wheeljack. It doesn’t matter what I wanted before. What matters is, what I have here right now. Okay?” Wheeljack felt himself nodding absently, before Ratchet called the Dinobots over to give them each their own cube. “Now all I want you to do is wait until it’s midnight, and then make a wish and drink your energon, okay?” The last thing the Ark needed was overcharged Dinobots rampaging around. Maybe next year. “Now go sit down, Wheeljack is going to show me the presentation you all worked so hard on.”

Grimlock stared at the cube between his tiny hands and back to Ratchet. “Okay.” Behind the mask Wheeljack couldn’t help grinning at the silent, unbridled glee he’d learned to read from the Dinbots’ fields. “But Papa Ratchet and Mama Wheeljack have to promise bedtime story later!”

“Promise.” Wheeljack and Ratchet echoed in tandem. Satisfied, Grimlock trundled off to find a spot, with the rest of the Dinobots following. They found a spot not too far, but not as far as where they’d been wrestling a moment ago, settling together in a comfortable set to watch the dark, star-speckled sky and wait, optics intent on the scene in front of them. Five minutes.

“I can’t get them to stop using those designations.”

“I’m not asking you to.” They’d created the Dinobots - so why not be papa and mama?

It was torture and peace, counting down the minutes as they watched the dark night sky in silence, feeling Ratchet’s calming field beside him. Putting down the cube, Wheelajack took up the detonator control with a deep intake. He heard it from inside the Ark, as the count down continued on his internal clock, adjusted to the local time standard and zone.

Ten, nine, eight - Wheeljack opened the detonator’s shield.

Seven, six five - he made sure the frequency was correct.

Four, three, two - and that the charge was primed.

 _One!_ The inventor didn’t remember pressing the button. That wasn’t the best part. Watching the sky blossom with exploding flowers of color, bright red, orange, yellow, green, blue - hearing the Dinobots cheer and scream their wishes into the night sky - feeling Ratchet’s hand lay on top of his, still holding the controller - _that_ was the best part. Turning his hand over to grip Ratchet’s, Wheeljack looked over, letting his mask slide back as he smiled at the medic - his medic.

Ratchet leaned in, but they met in the middle, bright patterns of carbonate, chloride, and nitrate exploding above them as their lip plates met. Hands squeezed, and Wheeljack swore he heard Ratchet’s plating slide closer, Ratchet rolled his faceplate against Wheeljack’s and ex-vented. “Happy New Year, Wheeljack.”

“Happy New Year, Ratchet.” It took him a moment, staring into Ratchet’s optics, to realize he’d raised his cube - and Wheeljack scrambled to follow up, picking up the cube with a grin and touching it gently against Ratchet’s cube. “And uh. Happy - wishes?” Ratchet laughed, and shook his head. “Okay. Well. I’m going to make a happy wish,” Wheeljack decided with a grin. “And you’re a part of it.”

Nodding, Ratchet took a sip of his high-grade. “Then both our wishes will come true.”


End file.
